How Charles Barkley and Richard Fisher are alike — and wrong

Charles Barkley and Richard Fisher have some traits in common: Both the basketball player–turned–TNT analyst and the financier–turned–Dallas Fed president are outspoken and entertaining to listen to.

But that’s not the comparison that Richard Moody, chief economist at Regions Financial, sees.

Moody says Fisher’s declaration that the Fed is “not the central banker of the world” reminds him of Barkley’s “I am not a role model” declaration. (Janet Yellen made comments similar to Fisher’s on Tuesday.)

Both Barkley and Fisher are wrong, says Moody.

The NBA Hall of Famer is wrong because, like it or not, their skill, wealth and visibility mean that professional athletes are held up as role models, Moody says. And the central banker is wrong because, like it or not, the dollar is the world’s reserve currency, meaning that the Fed is in effect the central banker to the world, particularly for the emerging-markets nations that peg or quasi-peg their currencies to the greenback.

Yes, Moody acknowledges, the emerging markets like India, South Africa and Turkey that are seeing capital outflows are “lying in the beds they have made with their own policy choices.” But that doesn’t let the Fed off the hook.

“Sure, when it comes down to it, the Fed is responsible for the U.S. economy, but this does not mean it should not at least be mindful of how its policy moves affect the rest of the world,” Moody writes. “After all, if your starting point is ‘We are not the central bank of the world,’ is it really that far before you channel the ghost of former U.S. Treasury Secretary John Connally and declare the U.S. dollar is ‘our currency but it’s your problem’? The problem with going down that road is one day you wake up and the U.S. dollar is no longer the world’s reserve currency and, next thing you know, you’re Argentina, only on a much bigger scale.”